


Papaya

by smallhorizons



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Castiel in the Bunker, Comfort Food, Domestic Fluff, Fluff, Human Castiel, Light-Hearted, Love Confessions, M/M, POV Castiel, dean thinks smoothies are for sissies, do smoothies count as comfort food, team free will vs. farmer's market, that's because he is an idiot, that's ok cas loves him anyway
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-23
Updated: 2015-11-23
Packaged: 2018-05-02 23:48:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,722
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5268488
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/smallhorizons/pseuds/smallhorizons
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Team Free Will visits a farmer's market, Castiel becomes infatuated with smoothies, and Dean is a little bit (okay a lot a bit) in love with Cas.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Papaya

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for the Castiel Color Challenge in September. The given prompt was "papaya". And I love smoothies, so that seemed like the right direction to go. 
> 
> Love declarations thru smoothies, commence.
> 
> Feel free to visit me at osirisjones.tumblr.com :)

It starts with a smoothie stand at a farmer’s market in upstate New York.

It was Sam’s idea to go, and though Dean had complained about going to some frou-frou organic hippy market, Castiel had perked up at the prospect. He didn’t know what a farmer’s market was, but he did know that he was tired and bruised from their hunt—a large vamp nest in the Catskills—and he wasn’t quite ready for the 24-hour two-day drive back to the Bunker. Something had deflated in Dean when Castiel said, quietly, that he’d like to go, and Dean had wordlessly shrugged into his coat and snapped, “Well? Aren’t you coming?” when Sam dawdled, eyes wide in surprise that Dean had surrendered so easily.

That was almost an hour ago, and Dean’s opinion of farmer’s market has done a complete and utter 180.

“Dude!” Dean exclaims. He’s holding too many bags to pull on Cas’ sleeve, so he flaps his elbow out and catches Cas’ bare biceps. “They’ve got _funnel cake_.”

“Oh my God,” Cas hears Sam complain distantly. Castiel ignores him for now and instead asks, “What’s funnel cake?”

Sam says, “Oh my _God_ ,” again, and Dean sputters a little bit and then says, “A piece of fried heaven, _that’s_ what it is,” and then he transfers all his bags to his left hand and pulls Cas along with him to a stand that smells mouth-wateringly of fried dough and powdered sugar.

“What kind of farmer’s market sells funnel cake?” Sam mutters behind them.

“Oh, shut up,” Dean says. “You’ve got all your organic kale and broccoli and rabbit nonsense over there.” He makes a vague gesture, letting go of Castiel’s wrist to do so. Cas runs his own fingers over the inside of his wrist, shivering a little.

Dean buys them a funnel cake to share, and only complains a little bit when Sam sneaks a piece, too. Chewing, Cas decides that while the texture and taste is pleasant, he doesn’t like how the dough sits so heavily in his stomach afterward. Sam seems to take this as a victory. Dean pouts a little, but mostly seems concerned. He’s telling Cas that if he feels sick they can go sit down in the shade for a while when Sam makes a surprised noise and stops in his tracks, leaving Cas to bump into his back.

“Whoa. Hey.” Sam points. “Smoothies.”

Dean makes a face. “Smoothies are just milkshakes that suck,” he says.

“I don’t know what a smoothie is, either,” Cas says. Sam throws his hands in the air and looks at Dean like, _Can you believe this?_

Dean heaves a sigh. “Fine,” he says. “Let’s go get the two hippies their shitty pretend-milkshakes.”

There’s a young woman standing at a table in front of a makeshift washing station, where a gangly teenager is rinsing out a used blender. There’s a large chalkboard propped up against the front of the table where it reads SMOOTHIES: STRAWBERRY-BANANA. KIWI-PEACH. RASPBERRY-BLUEBERRY-BANANA. HONEYDEW-KIWI. MANGO-STRAWBERRY. And, OUR SPECIAL: PAPAYA-BANANA.

“ _Honeydew kiwi_ ,” Dean mutters, a sarcastic tilt to his voice. “Seriously?”

Sam orders a mango-strawberry smoothie and makes what Dean describes as an O-face when he takes the first sip. “DUDE,” he says. And then, “Oh, man, this is awesome,” and he grins at the girl, who smiles back at him with pink cheeks.

“What about you?” the girl says, turning towards Cas with one last smile at Sam. “What do you want?”

Cas reads over the menu, looking at the little chalk drawings of fruit and berries dancing next to the options. “Um,” he says.

There’s a creeping sense of unease at the back of his neck. He’s been human only for a few months now, and choices are—difficult. When they first went shopping for new clothes, he mostly just let Sam and Dean throw things that they deemed were his size in a shopping cart. At diners, he lets Sam and Dean order first and then just orders what one of them is having. He alternates every other meal, so if at lunch time he orders Sam’s chicken Caesar salad then at dinner he orders Dean’s pulled pork sandwich on garlic bread.

There are six options. That’s at least four options too many.

“I don’t—I don’t know what I want,” he says when the girl repeats the question. His stomach is tight with worry. The funnel bread from earlier is too heavy.

Dean heaves out a long breath and Cas tenses, readies himself for a disparaging comment. But Dean just says, “Hey, get one of each. We’re only here for a day. Might as well try everything. We can all share.”

For one overwhelming moment, Castiel wants to kiss Dean. Cradle his cheeks between his hands and gasp into each other’s mouths as their lips meet.

The girl laughs. “Man after my own heart,” she says, and she gets to mixing their smoothies.

They get everything except for the mango-strawberry smoothie, because Sam points out it doesn’t make sense to pay for another one when he’s perfectly willing to share. After Dean pays, they take their smoothie buffet to a bench in the shade and pass the smoothies around, sharing their thoughts aloud.

Dean reluctantly says that the honeydew-kiwi isn’t that bad. He closes his eyes and says, “Oh, man,” when he takes his first sip of the banana-strawberry smoothie. His favorite is the raspberry-blueberry-banana. He drinks half of it before Cas can even get a sip.

Sam mostly sticks to his mango-strawberry, but he also likes the kiwi-peach.

Cas likes them all. But when he takes the first sip of the papaya-banana smoothie, he lets slip a contented little hum and smiles around the straw. He finishes the smoothie before Sam or Dean can try.

Before they leave, they get another papaya-banana smoothie to share, and this time Cas remembers to let Dean and Sam have at least one sip each before he drinks the rest.

 

* * *

 

Cas gets a little obsessed with smoothies.

Okay, he amends. A lot obsessed with smoothies.

He tries a pineapple-orange smoothie in Florida when they’re hunting a family a ghouls. Pomegranate-kiwi-blueberry in South Carolina. Kale-spinach-carrot-horseradish in California, which is surprisingly spicy, and which Cas can’t really formulate an opinion on.

He learns some things. Strawberry-banana smoothies are everywhere, he finds. He realizes he prefers it with a whole banana, at least six large strawberries, and a half-cup of whole milk with some ice cubes thrown in. He likes how hearty it is. Sometimes it feels like a full meal.

He learns that yogurt, especially Greek yogurt, makes for a good smoothie base, although sometimes the Greek yogurt can be overpoweringly sour.

He learns that smoothies that are too citrusy make his tongue hurt, and smoothies that are too sweet make his teeth hurt.  He learns that he best likes smoothies that are thick enough to hold a straw upright.

He learns that papaya-banana is still his favorite. He also learns it’s very rare.

He learns that Dean likes to watch him try the first sip, likes to ask him afterwards how the smoothie ranks and if Cas would get it again. He learns that if he gets smoothie on his top lip when he’s drinking without a straw, Dean will hand him a napkin. Later, Dean uses the napkin himself, taking Castiel’s jaw in one hand and carefully wiping his mouth off with the other. Later still, Dean uses his thumb.

Even later, Dean uses his mouth. Chases the flavor of Castiel’s smoothie of the day off his lips and into his mouth. Cas can’t decide which is sweeter: the smoothies, or Dean’s kisses.

One day he stumbles into the kitchen at eleven in the morning, still exhausted from driving twelve hours the day before and not getting home until almost four. Dean is struggling with something on a cutting board, his back to Cas.

“Hello, Dean,” Cas mumbles around a yawn, and Dean says, “ _Shit,_ ” and, “Jesus, you scared me,” and then, “Hey, sweetheart.” He lifts his arm so Cas can nuzzle into his side, press his face into Dean’s neck and press a chaste kiss along his jawline. Dean drapes his arm over Cas’ shoulders and pulls him close.

When Cas opens his eyes, he blinks down at the cutting board. There’s a mangled papaya split open, on its way to being cut into healthy chunks.

“I, um,” Dean starts. “I was gonna make you a smoothie.”

“We don’t have a blender,” Cas says automatically. Dean clears his throat and Cas tilts his head back to get a good look at him. There’s a faint pink blush spreading across the crests of his cheekbones.

“I went to Walmart this morning,” Dean says. “And, uh, now we do. Have a blender.” He shrugs a little.

Cas blinks. The nearest Walmart is over sixty miles away. “Oh,” he says.

“Yeah,” Dean says.

They stare down at the papaya together. “Dean Winchester,” Cas says, pressing his cheek against Dean’s collarbone. “I love you immensely.”

“Oh, well,” Dean says, and he clears his throat and says, “Um. Same. I mean, you too. I—you know.”

“Yes, I know,” Cas says. They’re quiet for a little while longer. Then Cas says, “I thought you were going to make me a smoothie.”

Dean laughs, a full-body affair, and he turns to Cas and bundles him up in a hug, wraps his arms tight around him and buries his nose in dark hair and mutters, “Christ, I love you so fucking much,” and Cas nudges at his jaw with the point of his nose until Dean catches on and they kiss, long and lush, one of Cas’ hands cradling the back of Dean’s head. They kiss until their breath comes heavily, until Cas groans against Dean’s mouth and whimpers his name, and Dean pulls away but only so that he can tilt Cas’ head back and press a series of kisses along his jaw, nipping at the sensitive skin just below Cas’ ear. Cas pulls him closer, whispering, “Dean, Dean, Dean,” and Dean’s breath hitches, and then.

Castiel’s stomach growls.

“Um,” Cas says.

Dean chuckles against his throat and kisses his Adam’s apple and then his lips and then his forehead.

“So,” Cas says. “You were going to make me a smoothie?”


End file.
